GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

19-08-2003, 02:02 AM

(Bill Oliver) wrote in
:

I may be a bit filosophical and it may even be OT to discuss the
morality issue here, but I'm sincerely interested in your views on
that; it might help me to put your other statements in context. Thanks
for the lively debate anyway,

It is a different debate. It is one thing to claim that one should
not buy German cars because they all used to collaborate with
Nazis in the 1930s.

It is *another* to claim that all German cars have bad brakes
because they all used to collaborate with Nazis in the 1930s.

For the first, you can use all the philosophical arguments you
want. For the latter, you test the cars.

That is clear, thank you. I agree with that.

However, it is a nice analogy, but to be honest, I think neither
replicates the argument Paghat is making. She does not say we should not
buy RU because MS lied in the past. And she also does not say RU is
dangerous because MS lied in the past.

She says that she thinks RU is unsafe and that all the evidence against
that statement are unreliable because they are largely sponsored by MS
themselves and (as we all know!) they lied in the past.

She says, in analogy, she thinks german cars are unsafe and that the
only ones denying that fact are the germans who are not to be trusted
because etc... (only an analogy, lets not get into a fight about that
:-) ).

Feel free to argue that one should not use a Monsanto product
because you don't like the company. I have no opinion on that.
That does not, however, say anything at all about Roundup.

Agreed, but again, that is not the position here. No one says we
shouldn't buy RU because of bad MS. The question is, how can one be sure
that the info requiered to make sound judgement is not tampered with,
when it is well known from the past that the company involved has no
problem whatsoever with tampering?

My question was the same that I asked Paghat a while ago: how can you be
so sure you're right when there is such a strong force operating in the
background to cloud our vision. Surely you must be worried about this
too; it has happened in the past so why not now again. I'm a bit amazed
how you ignore this point. (Again, I'm not asking for a moral judgement
on MS, just a practical thing: Historically they pulled our leg several
times; how do you know they do not so again (in the light of the
enormous consequenses that our current political desicions will have for
the future)).

Ursa..

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